SEPARATE OPINION OF JUDGE A.A. CANÇADO TRINDADE 1. I have concurred in the adoption by the Inter-American Court of the instant Judgment in the case of the Mapiripán Massacre. Given the special gravity of the facts in the instant case, which reflect the true human tragedy suffered by Colombia in recent years, I feel the obligation to state my reflections on the matters discussed by the Court in the instant Judgment, as the basis for my position on the subject. For this I will address, in this Separate Opinion, five key points, which in my view are especially significant: a) the broad scope of the general duties of protection (Articles 1(1) and 2) of the American Convention revisited; b) finding of international responsibility of the respondent State (in the circumstances of the instant case); c) the broad scope of Article 1(1) of the American Convention and the erga omnes obligations of protection; d) international responsibility of the State and the aggravating circumstances revisited; and e) reassertion of the prevalence of Law over the use of force. I. The Broad Scope of the General Duties of Protection (Articles 1(1) and 2) of the American Convention Revisited 2. I begin by firmly stating the view that I have invariably expressed in this Court, for years, regarding the broad scope of the general duties of protection set forth in Articles 1(1) and 2 of the American Convention. The general duty enshrined in Article 1(1) of the Convention – to respect and ensure the exercise, without any discrimination, of the rights that it protects- is not “accessory” to the provisions regarding the rights set forth in the Convention, individually considered, one by one. The American Convention is not breached only and insofar as there is an abridgment of a specific right protected therein, but also when one of the general duties set forth in the Convention /Articles 1(1) and 2) is not fulfilled. 3. Article 1(1) of the American Convention is much more than a mere “accessory”, it is a general duty imposed on the States Party and it encompasses the whole set of rights protected under the Convention. Its continued violation can entail additional abridgments of the Convention, added on to the original abridgments. Article 1(1), thus, has a broad scope. It refers to a permanent duty of the States, non-fulfillment of which can generate new victims, causing per se additional violations, without the need for them to be related to the rights that were breached originally. I have been insisting, within this Court, on my hermeneutics of Article 1(1) – as well as that of Article 2 - of the Convention, which maximizes protection of human rights under the Convention, since my Dissenting Opinion in the Caballero Delgado y Santana versus Colombia case (reparations, Judgment of 29.01.1997). 4. The Court has fortunately endorsed it, beginning with the Suárez Rosero versus Ecuador case (Judgment of 12.11.1997), with immediate positive results, and in subsequent Judgments (those in the cases of Castillo Petruzzi et al. versus Peru, of 30.05.1999; of Baena Ricardo et al. versus Panama, of 02.02.2001; of Hilaire, Constantine and Benjamin et al. versus Trinidad and Tobago, of 21.06.2002; of the Five Pensioners versus Peru, of 28.02.2003), as I have just recalled in my recent Separate Opinion (paras. 15-21), seven days ago, in the case of the Girls Yean and